ACTION URGED ON OZONE

Special to the New York Times

Published: December 2, 1986

Correction Appended

GENEVA, Dec. 1—
The United States today urged an international conference here to consider steps to freeze and ultimately eliminate production of chlorofluorocarbons and other chemical gases that deplete the atmospheric ozone shield. The ozone protects the Earth against harmful ultraviolet radiation from the sun.

In a draft protocol to the 1985 Vienna Convention for the Protection of the Ozone Layer, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Richard E. Benedick said chlorofluorocarbon emissions from aerosols, air conditioners, refrigerators and other sources should be kept to 1986 levels, and eventually be virtually eliminated.

''The results of our models and inquiries continue to indicate the existence of a serious and growing threat to the integrity of the ozone layer,'' Mr. Benedick said. He said production and emissions of chlorofluorocarbons and other chemicals linked to ozone depletion were increasing.

Chlorofluorocarbons are banned in the United States and Canada.

Scientists have established links between the amount of radiation reaching the Earth and skin cancer, herpes, cateracts and tropical diseases as well as diminished crop yields, the U.N. environmental agency said.

The five-day conference, held under the auspices of the United Nations Environmental Program, has drawn technical, legal and scientific experts from more than 40 nations, 14 non-governmental agencies such as the World Health Organization and institutes concerned with chemical manufacture, aerosols and refrigerations. The discussions follow meetings earlier this year to examine the uses of chlorofluorocarbons and and discuss ways to limit them.

The Vienna convention has been signed by 20 countries and ratified by eight, including the United States. The protocol being discussed here would provide means for enforcing it.

Other control strategies to be discussed here include a Canadian proposal that global limits on the emission of chlorofluorocarbons and other agents be imposed gradually, country by country, officials said.

The conference is expected to debate these and several other options for an enforcement protocol, but it not expected to adopt such a final document at this meeting, the officials said.

A U.N. environmental official said that despite the bans in the United States and Canada chlorofluorocarbon production worldwide had increased annually by about 7 percent in l983 and l984. It now stands at about 600,000 tons per year.

Correction: December 11, 1986, Thursday, Late City Final Edition A report in Science Times on Dec. 2 about a proposal to protect the earth's ozone layer misstated limits on the use of chlorofluorocarbons in the United States. They are generally banned as spray can propellants but are used in most air-conditioning systems and in many other applications.